You can check out some photos here of my trip. If you don't want to read the whole story just check out the monastery story at the end. I know this is really long and I apologize but for the very curious here's the full version!
We left at 7am from the Chengdu bus station. This was the start of quite the journey and adventure. Jackie and Lucy are cousins. Jackie works with us. She is a student of Prof Zhang. And Lucy is a freshman in college. It was the first trip that they took by themselves. I was so impressed with their scheduling. They didn’t tell us what we were doing a lot of the time but they knew exactly what we were supposed to do! They were so wonderful to be our guides. The whole three days was about $45 total!
Thoughts on the Giant Buddha: It is the biggest Buddha in the world. We walked up to the top and all of a sudden there was a huge stone head. Buddha has huge earlobes and a red dot on his forehead. His hair is in black knots above his perfectly shaped eye brows. His eyes are looking down over the three rivers and he is sitting upright with his hands on his knees. Buddha has changed a lot over the years and you can tell what dynasty or period each Buddha was built in.
After we decided to climb to the bottom we waited in a 30 minute line to make the “dangerous” trek down. The trek was made in about one hour down steep stairs and Chinese people pushing and shoving their way down. At every bend every person had to get their picture with the Buddha. So a combination of these things made it actually very dangerous. I started maneuvering my backpack so that no one could get in front of me and I created space for myself to get down very American of me!!
At the bottom I looked up at the magnificent Buddha and he was looking down at me with empty eyes. The incense was burning and I got a picture of me and his big toe. I looked over the edge at the three rivers that were fighting to go down stream. The Buddha was supposed to help the boats pass safely over the turbulent water. Apparently, a lot of people had drowned so a Buddhist monk started the construction of a Buddha. Legend has it that the boats started passing by without any trouble after the Buddha was carved. Evidence says that so much of the mountain was removed and put into the water that the current actually changed making the passing of the boats safe.
We were only at his feet for a few minutes before we were on our way again. The ascent was only to be anticipated with pain and a lot of sweat but we actually just walked along the river to some other museums including some burial caves from another dynasty. So it was just a sweaty trek! There were stone statues of dogs and guards in action posses in front of the burial sites. Quite impressively well thought out!
We negotiated a petty cab to take us to the front of the entrance to the Giant Buddha. On the way we saw the scenic route of Leshan. Riding by the side of the mountain, Jackie pointed out the sleeping Buddha. Thoughts on this range but in general I don’t understand how that could ever be a comforting idea to have a sleeping Buddha in the side of the mountain. His empty eyes are closed.
At 4 we took a bus to
We started our trek up the mountain around 7 the next morning. Amy at this point had gotten sick and had to go back to
We jammed the day packed with climbing up and down the ancient stairs that outlined the mountain from the top to the bottom. We saw the mischievous, greedy monkeys who have gotten away with begging food from the travelers for generations. They will demand and without a stick in your hand you are left to hand over ALL of your food to these ungrateful creatures. So I bought my bamboo walking stick from a 90 year old woman for 20 cents. I consider it one of my better investments in my lifetime.
We walked along the pools of beautiful water. It is water that just looks crisp. The innocence of the water was inviting so we wadded into the river down steam and splashed around. I taught my companions a new word that day: Rejuvenating! It took me about 1000 stairs to finally explain the essence of the word but it kept my thoughts on the beauty of the water and not on the steps that I was climbing!!
Men carrying “wagons” on their shoulders would run past with the rich, lazy people riding up the mountain. I tended to feel sorry for them but they have been doing this business for years and it seems like they enjoy the competition of seeing who can make it up the fastest. The mountain people are very healthy looking and shockingly very old. Most of the people are in their 80s or 90s having lived their entire lives on the mountain walking up and down then steps and using the natural medicines to help any sort of ailments. We stopped for some water and a really old lady came up to me to sell me some trinkets. I smiled at her and told her in my best Chinese that she was beautiful. I was rewarded with a three tooth smile and a giggle. I didn’t buy any trinket but the smile was enough to remind me of the people on the mountain.
Later in the afternoon we boarded a bus to go to the top. It was a beautiful hour ride to the top. Ironically the bus tv was showing some sort of weird repetitive pole dancing girls. It was completely inappropriate for any audience but on a bus going to the top of a Buddhist mountain? Common. Anyway I kept my eyes glued to the scenery unfolding behind every bend in the road. The flora is everything you think Chinese flora should be. It all is connected in some way by vines or branches. The forests are so old and many of the trees look to be thousands of years old. They are not particularly tall but very mature and almost wise looking.
The top greeted us with a burst of cold, pure air. I quickly pulled out my sweater and jacket leaving my pack a little lighter. We immediately started climbing the stairs again. At this point my calves were about to scream at me but I ignored them and kept going up and up. The air was getting noticeably thinner. We climbed about 1000 ft to reach the cable cars at about 9,000 ft above sea level. We start seeing the top of the tree lines and I was getting curious about how much farther we have to go but I just looked down and let my bamboo walking stick lead me up the unending steps. We stopped many times to take pictures of the views, which were rather breathtaking.
The top of the mountain is a euphoric experience. Looking over the blankets of green covering the mountains below with the rivers winding through the mountains was just incredible. I was promised that we would be back in the morning to see the sunrise so with that we started our trek to the monastery they had planned for us to stay. This is where the real adventure stared.
The monastery
An hour and a half later my legs were shaking and we had finally reached the monastery. Hard to describe the run down place but it is the most remote place on the mountain taking about 1.5 hours climbing or descending to get there from any place with transportation. I don’t know when it was built but it appeared it hadn’t been restored in the last 100 years. The grass was tall surrounding the incense tables outside and the monastery structure was uncharacteristically unimpressive. It was the most common monastery I had seen. I watched the monks walk in and out doing their nightly duties as my companions negotiated for a room.
Everyone kept looking at the weigouren who would come to this place. I was definitely not expected at all.
We were finally led into a wooden building, up a ladder and down a dark hallway to “the last room available”. I was standing in the room trying to get a grip on what was happening. The three beds in the room were dully lit by the one light bulb that hung from the short ceiling. The wooden boards gave with every step. Two other female students showed up and I was informed that they would be staying with us too. I looked at the three single beds and the five people and appreciated that it wasn’t my problem. I sat down listening to the Chinese that was whirling around me as my friends were getting to know the other two Chinese girls. We got some boiling water and ate our noodles, which were actually quite good and helped warm me up some. The shakes really started after that. Lucy looked at me and I understood, “face… red”. I felt my face and it was burning up coloring my whole face red as if I had a bad sunburn. I was a little delusional at that point and all of a sudden I was drinking some Chinese medicine with the 4 concerned Chinese faces starring at me. I was trying to will myself not to get sick and I knew I should be drinking water. But that would only punish me.
There was one squatty potty for the whole place and it was down the dark hallway and down the ladder.
At 8 I had brushed my teeth and made my last trip to the squatty potty (or so I thought). I climbed under the covers clothed in everything that I had. The sheets hadn’t been washed in ages and so I just decided I was going to not look. I blew up my traveling pillow and snuggled down where many people had been before and tried to get warm. The hot pad under the sheet provided heat that my body wasn’t producing so I was extremely thankful for that.
At 9 I couldn’t hold it any more so I asked if I anyone would go to the toilet with me. Jackie said she would and so the both of us tried to get the door open. The door was not meant for the frame that it was shoved into. The latch on the door seemed amusingly arbitrary as no one could really get in or out with a lot of effort. Finally after involving Lucy we got the door opened. So we turned on the flashlight to light the hallway and the ladder. This routine happened again at 12. I had actually fallen asleep between those times but the other girls hadn’t. When I stirred they told me that they had been waiting for me to get up so we could all go to the toilet together.
At 4 I woke up to the smell of incense and the bongs from the monastery. Unbelieveable. I thought that if you live on a mountain the whole point was to be relaxed and meditative. What the monks were doing up at 4 is beyond me. Anyway I was awake and so were the other girls. We turned on the light and I was instructed to put on all of my clothes, which wasn’t hard because I already had them all on! So we left the monastery and started our trek back up the mountain. I felt pretty good and was thankful for whatever the Chinese medicine had done to help me sleep the night before.
The Reward
At six we made it back up to the golden Buddha. We were rewarded with an incredible show. I staked out a place on the side of the temple stairs and watched with awe as the sun made its appearance. The lighter it got the more mountains appeared. They seemed to pop out of the clouds as the clouds rose. The sun splashed pink, orange and yellow all over the sky as it peaked through the clouds. I watched as the colors took over the clouds and I loved watching all of the people point and gasp in awe. Behind me rainbows scattered the sky. All around the sky was lit up with pure, magnificent colors— a show never to be replicated again. Every sunrise on the top of the mountain is different and special for each daily group of travelers. I looked at the abandoned golden Buddha behind me. It just sat there as people watched the show only a real God could create uniquely every morning. It was a fabulous Sunday morning. We sat and ate our breakfast after most of the show was over. I had brought my Skippy peanut butter that we enjoyed on the crackers that they had brought. For another hour we hiked around taking pictures and just watching the sun rise into the sky and the different ways it would shine on the mountains below. It was the best gift a girl could want.
I got back to
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